Occupational health and safety news and guidance

A Grimsby haulage company has been sentenced for safety failings after a
worker was killed when a row of steel coils 'collapsed like dominos'
trapping him under their five-tonne weight.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) prosecuted ABC (Grimsby) Ltd.
after Alan Burr, a warehouseman and forklift truck driver, was fatally
crushed when he tried to repair some torn packaging on a roll of coil at
the firm's warehouse in Henderson Quay, Immingham Docks, on 27 January
2010.

Grimsby Crown Court heard that Mr. Burr, a long-serving employee at
the company, had been stacking the narrow banded coils on rolls in
batches of four or five, with a gap between each coil. Each coil
measured five feet in diameter and weighed around one tonne.

As he was standing between two of the rolls to repair the damaged
wrapping, one of them toppled, causing a domino effect to the stack. The
52-year-old, from East Halton, Immingham, was trapped under the weight
and was pronounced dead at the scene.

The investigation found that the method used by Mr. Burr to store the
coils was a common one and others had stored them in a similar way. No
one from the company had instructed the employees not to do this.

ABC (Grimsby) Ltd. of Lancaster Approach, North Killingholme, Immingham,
pleaded guilty to two charges of breaching the Health and Safety at Work
etc. Act 1974. The company was fined a total of £25,000 and ordered to
pay £20,000 costs.